I take my 30 years of reading the great classics of Economics, Literature, History, Political Science, Philosophy and Theology, and apply what I've learned to the most demanding problems which leaders face, especially investors and entrepreneurs.

July 4th Question, Part III: Americans Revolt Billions of Times a Day

Alexis De Tocqueville once said that the limits placed on the central power in the new world are different from the limits placed on national power in the old world. In the New World, the national government has jurisdiction in certain specific areas. It is prohibited by law and custom from transgressing the boundaries of its jurisdiction. In that sense its power is severely limited. But within those boundaries it is sovereign and almost completely beyond challenge. If something such as war or taxing power is deemed a ‘federal matter,’ challenges to that power, for example the Whiskey Rebellion, were historically rare and suppressed mercilessly when they did occur.

On the other hand, Tocqueville says, the Old World functioned quite differently. The monarchs tended to be in constant conflict with other political powers regarding proper jurisdiction. The crown and the aristocracy and the colonies and provinces were engaged in an eternal game of tug of war, with each citing their own interpretation of law and custom to attempt to limit the jurisdiction of the others. Tocqueville observed that the limits to the powers of the central government in that case were largely imposed by the practical limits of enforcement. If a province was too well armed, then they went unmolested. If the aristocracy had the armies to resist, then they resisted. If colonies were too far away, or protected by seasonal factors then they had greater liberty. The monarch could only rule what he had the power to take and to keep, whereas America at the time that Democracy In America was being written tended to respect federal authority even where federales were few and far between.

It seems to be that as the United States federal government and the Presidency in particular have gradually morphed into something more like a European monarchy, our attitude towards its sovereignty has shifted. Certainly no state or province or faction of the ruling class would dare to challenge the military might of the United States in a single act of open revolt. But as time goes on we challenge it in small acts of secret revolt. Violation, for example, of our draconian system of immigration laws has become quite common. How many appointees to the federal bench or to the office of Attorney General must be caught in nannygate scandals involving child care payments to illegal aliens made under the table before we get the fact that our governing class, even that part which is directly pledged to enforce the law, routinely ignore this law?

We have a Treasury secretary who cheated on his taxes. But he is not the only one. There are probably more people who buy goods and services via the internet and catalogues who don’t pay sales taxes than people who do. We’ve been rehabbing our 132-year-old home for several years now, and I can tell you, some subcontractors expect to be paid in cash under the table. We follow speed limits when we think they are being enforced only. Dads let their teenaged kids drink beer. People cross the state line to buy fireworks, or any good when the sales tax is lower. People on unemployment compensation stretch it out so they can work on their eBay business.

Retirees buy discount drugs from Canada. Families share prescription antibiotics with other family members for whom they have not been prescribed. A man with cancer smokes marijuana even though he doesn’t live in a medical marijuana state. When we are driving at night and we come to a T in the road with a stop sign and there is no one else around, we slow down and roll through the stop sign. We eschew seatbelt laws when we take short safe jaunts up the block. We let our kids do a little practice driving in the parking lot before they get their learners permit.

We don’t recycle every time they tell us to. We top off the gas tank even though they tell us not to. If they announce they are going to illegalize normal light bulbs, we buy more, not less of them to stock up. If we think that gasoline will kill the poison ivy better than some biodegradable eco-approved watered down stuff, we use the gas. Even though certain states had anti-sodomy statutes on the books up until just a few years ago, gay people had sex in their homes all the time, and did not give a thought to the ordinances.

Businesses split in half so as to be qualified for small business exemptions from federal regulation. Farmers look the other way when they hire day laborers who clearly are not citizens. Federal regulators write their regulations, and financiers change their form of organization in unforeseen ways to avoid the regulations, even ones they pushed for.George Soros delists his hedge fund to avoid rules his beneficiaries wrote. Businesses treat many regulations as cost of business and just pay the fine rather than incur extreme costs. Factories and labs create commonsense workarounds to arbitrary OSHA regulations.

And most people have absolutely no moral compunction about any of these violations of the either the spirit or the letter of the law, because deep down they no longer believe that the law, especially the tax code, represents any compelling moral principle, nor do its dictates seem any longer to be fair. They don’t think their home state has earned taxes on the Amazon purchases or that it deserves any share of the mutually beneficial exchange between you and your dry wall guy.

I bet you can think of a few dozen more examples, and increasingly we’re all in business and in personal life thinking of more and more ways to game a system which we have less and less faith in.

It’s not civil disobedience that I’m talking about. It’s the opposite: Civil disobedience is meant to be noticed. It is a price paid in the hope of creating social change. What I’m talking about is not based on hope; in fact, it has given up much hope on social change. It thinks the government is a colossal amoeba twitching mindlessly in response to tiny pinpricks of pain from an endless army of micro-brained interest groups. The point is not to teach the amoeba nor to guide it, but simply to stay away from the lethal stupidity of its pseudopods.

The amoeba does not get smarter but it does get hungrier and bigger. On the other hand, we get smarter. More and more of our life takes place outside of the amoeba’s reach: in the privacy of our own homes, or in capital accounts in other nations, or in the fastest growing amoeba avoidance zone ever created, cyberspace. We revolt decision by decision, transaction by transaction, because we believe deep down that most of what government tells us to do is at bottom illegitimate.

Post Your Comment

Post Your Reply

Forbes writers have the ability to call out member comments they find particularly interesting. Called-out comments are highlighted across the Forbes network. You'll be notified if your comment is called out.

Comments

It’s getting harder and harder to fly below the radar, especially considering that drones will soon be with us. After I lost my last job and found no place will even consider hiring someone my age (75), I decided to go Gault and just disappear into my own little world, grow my veggies and grass-fed beef, collect my social security check which is not welfare since I paid into the fund for 50 years and so did my late husband who didn’t live long enough to collect anything, and have no reportable income. If the government could collect nothing from anyone, it would starve the beast, and eventually the beast would die, along with those who suckle off it.

I think we are at a crossroads in this country. If people go around breaking small laws like speeding and whatnot, that’s not a big deal in terms of the greater picture. But as more people disobey more significant (bad) laws, the risk is that law won’t be respected whatsoever. I mean, at this point I !@$%ing hate the government—anything from the TSA to the DMV to foreign aid to the fact that they can’t even repave a road properly. I think people like me are in the minority, but maybe not for long.

I obey natural law. The law of gravity. The speed of light. As to the rest? I’m a Jeffersonian:

“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the limits of the law’ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.” — Thomas Jefferson

Bowyer just put into print what millions of Americans have been doing. Some for years. One thing he didn’t touch on is the ol’ fashioned practice of “Barter”.

Yea it is alive and well in many places all over this republic. I think mainly in the southern states including my home state of Texas.

Of course this is all underground so to speak, off the radar, on the sly, but still out in the public. If you want something, can’t afford it or just want to barter, that is the way deals are negotiated or struck most of the time.

Trading stuff or labor is common among the poorer or older people around where I live, and I believe it is increasing year by year. It is the world’s oldest method of getting stuff or getting something done.

Try it, it is a skill that has to be developed but well worth it if you have skills or talent to trade. And it is not illegal.

As to the other, here is a little quote. Most don’t like me to leave it around the net, calling me names (hey!!! snooki) but I think it is becoming more real every year in this Republic that Americans live in. It is something that no one wants or even wants to think about but it may be someday the last resort.

“The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed – where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once.” 2009 Judge Alex Kozinski

You absolutely nailed it Jerry!! And I find chiguy31′s comments to be spot on as well. I thought I was the only one, regarding the IRS building plane crash, to have such feelings. I’ve been in business for over 30 years. The past 7 years I have had enraging experiences that put me in the same camp as you folks. Thank God we’re getting wind of what’s happening and we have the same perspective on it all. I don’t know if we can change the tide, but, we can at least try.

This is a depressing article. Along with the ’700 Club’ item today about the Gibson Guitar Co. 3 AM raid and confiscation of tools, computers and inventory (with as yet NO CHARGES FILED), our sense of justice and liberty and faith in our system is sorely grieved.

Famous, heroic psychiatrist Wilhelm Reich, MD, escaped the clutches of the Nazis, then escaped the clutches of the Communists, then rescued came to the liberty and safety of a New England farm only to be imprisoned by the F.D.A. and die in a federal prison.

I believe it was Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who said, “Just as I am obliged to obey just laws, one is bound to disobey unjust laws.” Something like that. Isn’t THAT what we need to do, and serve God wherever He puts us?

Dear Lord, Creator of all that is, was, and ever will be, please hedge around Your city on the hill, and restore our nation, dedicated to You in Jesus’ name. Amen.

There have always been dead-letter laws that citizens do not obey and police do not enforce. This discretion is what has made the burden of sodomy laws, laws equating pi to 3, and laws requiring a man with a lantern to go in front of an automobile, tolerable in society. They are ignored by everyone except for the compilers of ‘books of silly laws’ which come out on a yearly basis.

Discretion is the oil that keeps any lawful society running.

I once read a book in which a (fictional) police officer on a ship was commended for “turning a blind eye to the ancient usages and customs while enforcing those regulations truly critical to ship discipline”. That book was written in 1953.

So dead letter laws are nothing new. The problem is, there are so MANY of them these days they foster a contempt for law in general.

Mr. Bowyer makes the same MISTAKE that many make regarding this subject — that is, they confuse the concepts of “civil disobedience” and “armed overthrow of the government”. They are two TOTALLY different things. He started off this series by asking whether we could/should have a second revolution, meaning a second “armed overthrow of the government”. Then, in this last segment, he changes the use of the word “revolt(revolution)” to mean mere “civil disobedience”. I don’t know anyone who would say that “civil disobedience” is not called for under certain circumstances, including 99.99% of all pastors! However, there are few people, and even fewer Christians, who would advocate an “armed overthrow of the government” under ANY circumstances. Yet, an “armed overthrow of the government” is EXACTLY what our Founders did and EXACTLY what we celebrate on July 4th.

I question the constitutionality of complicated laws that only a lawyer might understand. In the computer world we call this KISS. That stands for Keep It Simple Stupid! We have evolved a system of law in which Paladins represent people in the courts. These Paladins are competent persuaders. So the people that can afford these Paladins get their way in a court room. We call these Paladins lawyers or attorneys. Rich people can afford Paladins. Poor people not so much. This is a form of anarchy in favor of people of wealth. The IRS and EPA both subscribe to complicated and often confusing bureaucratic laws and procedures that even their own people have difficulty keeping straight. An author of Christian Financial Books wanted to research the EPA laws. So he asked the EPA to send him a copy of the laws. Fully expecting a small parcel in the mail. It took 3 semitrucks loaded full to send him the material he asked for. The IRS foolishly volunteered to answer questions over the phone for people filling out their forms a few years ago. 6 out of 10 answers were wrong! If the IRS people cannot keep it straight, how in the world can the general public keep it straight? KISS. From that stand point I can see why laws are frequently disobeyed. In my youth, it was illegal for me to have a beer before the age of 18. But it was not illegal for me to be drafted, sent into harm’s way, and treated as an adult at 17. Most states have laws on the books making 21 the legal drinking age now. It is not illegal for a woman to have a baby at 18. It is illegal for them to have a drink. If you are an adult, you are an adult with adult responsibilities. To me these laws make little sense. We once had a law called the Interstate Commerce Act. Supposedly if you did not have a occupied building in the state you are sending it to, the state had no right to double taxation. The internet has made this law trash. KISS. The concept of governing sexual choices in human relations is valid. But only because those relationships effect other people’s healths. Disease runs wild in communities where sexual mores are not in force. Yet even there, KISS should apply. Making laws that are too complicated for people to really understand will make for rebellion. Not violent rebellion. That is stupid. I speak of individual choices to ignore laws that are frequently not enforceable. That is why complicated laws that no one really understands are not enforceable. These laws discriminate. Therefore because they discriminate, they are really unconstitutional anyway.